Peace for the elements, the reign of Zuko
by Idreamofivan
Summary: Set after the show finale. Zuko finally understands Azula, Zuko becomes really sick, the rest of the gaang goes in an adventure to rescue Ursa. cannon. please R
1. Chapter 1

Reposting this chapter after the awesome Jiao-jie volunteered to translate my Spanglish to English! Thanks.

**Disclaimer:** I do not own any character in this fiction, I ll even give away the ones that I might make up to make sure the story makes sense.

PPPPPPPP

"You? All you had to do was smile and people loved you! Mom, Dad, Iroh…even Mai and Ty lee…Me? I was just…" Her voice cut off, almost as if she was about to cry.

_But…Azula doesn't cry unless is out of frustration and never while talking to me,_ Zuko thought, but she definitely looked like she was about to.

"You were the perfect one," Zuko stated, confused.

"PERFECT?" She yelled, incredulous and angry as if she hated that word, "Azula, the prodigy, right?" She sobbed this time. Zuko, in disbelief, had to start to consider that Azula did cry sometimes. "YES! That was SUCH a blessing!" She said sarcastically, half laughing, half crying.

Zuko was getting more and more confused.

"Don't look at me like that, Brother! It was always so easy for you!"

Zuko stared at her in total disbelief.

_Easy for me? _he thought, but didn't interrupt her.

He had to admit that a part of him was sort of happy to see Azula vulnerable, to know that he wasn't the only one who suffered in childhood; that Azula had apparently had it tough too and that she had felt Zuko was the one that had what she wanted. Not that it made him happy to see his sister so upset, but it was nice to see that she was human! It was nice that they could share something other than their DNA; even if all they shared was a crappy childhood.

"I was the one woken up in the middle of the night and dragged out by our father to be paraded around! I was the one forced to do awful things, because 'I was a prodigy.' Father gave you a Fire Nation soldier uniform on your 5th birthday. Do you know what he got me?"

Zuko didn't remember his 5th birthday gift, much less Azula's. He always thought her presents were better, but he didn't really remember any of them. Yet, hearing his sister's voice he started to doubt that her presents had been better.

Zuko shook his head and barely whispered, "No," a trace of guilt in his voice.

"A sleepless night, burning puppies to death!" She screamed, "He woke me up in the middle of the night and took me with his friends. They had puppies at different distances and father forced me to 'Try my aim and the strength of my fire.' 'Show them how good you are Azula, make me proud,' he said as he forced me to burn them all to the ground. 'Happy birthday,' he said, in the early morning when he finally let me go back to sleep."

Azula's voice had turned emotionless while telling the story, though this time, it didn't make Zuko think she was a monster without feelings, but it actually reminded him of Mai. He knew Mai had a lot of feelings, all bottled up inside but she had been forced to cork them, hide them and never express anything.

"I am scared that if one day I let them out," Mai had said once, "They will never stop flowing and I won't be able to handle them. I might go insane!"

Well, it seemed like there was a crack in Azula's bottle. The feelings were leaking and she was doing her best to handle them.

"How did Mom allow all that?" Zuko whispered, confused and controlled his impulse to hug his sister. He really didn't know what Azula had gone through and now he was feeling guilty he hadn't helped her; he hadn't been there for his baby sister.

"When Fire Lord Ozai tells you to shut up and not to tell anyone. You don't tell anyone, Zuko." Her eyes became watery. "I remember envying you so much. You could sleep at night and Mom could comfort you if you had a nightmare, you could talk to her! I couldn't tell anyone what was eating me up. I spent the nights in fear, praying that he wouldn't come and get me that night. Or lying in my bed, unable to sleep, for when I closed my eyes, I would see the terrible things he had forced me to do. When Mom left, things got even worse! And puppies turned into innocent people and kids, just burnt to the ground to please some old generals, as sick in the head as Father was!" She stopped for a second, and then barely whispered, "As sick as me."

Hearing all that their father had forced Azula to do in her childhood made him reconsider all he had ever thought about his childhood and his sister's. Now he was wondering if he was really the one that got the short end of the stick. If being "the prodigy" or "the perfect one" had made her life any better.

He hugged his sister this time, he thought she was going to pull away and not let him touch her. Quite the contrary, he was surprised when Azula welcomed the embrace and started crying on his shoulder.

"You are not like him, Azula," Zuko found himself saying, "You can change, it's up to you! You don't have to be like that! I am so sorry! I should have known! I should have sensed something was happening, I should have helped you!"

"It was better that way," Azula said, wiping her tears. "I envied you, yes. I wished I could be the one being comforted by our mother and the one that could play around happily. But I loved you Zuko, I prayed that you would never find out, that he would never dragged you and forced you to the things he forced me to do. There was too much goodness, you were too pure to be corrupted like that."

"What about you? There is goodness and pureness in you too!"

"Not anymore, Zuko," She said sadly, "Not anymore, but I still love you, you know? You shouldn't have stand in the middle of my lighting that day. You shouldn't have! There was a reason it wasn't directed to you! I thought I could do it… I thought I could. But I realized when I had you in front of me, that I just couldn't."

Zuko realized for the first time that the lighting directed at Katara wasn't part of an evil master plan Azula had, but it had been the only thing Azula could think of when forced to throw lighting at her brother.

Zuko felt lightheaded, the heaviness that he had felt in his chest since Azula's lighting felt even heavier. The scar was healing and everybody seemed to think he was ok but he hadn't felt "right" since then. He wondered one more time if he should go to a healer and get his chest checked, but he discarded the idea right away, just like every other time he thought about it. He had too much to do and too little time to do it. The thought of someone telling him that something was wrong with him and that he had to spend a week on the medical ward was not appealing to him in any way.

He took a deep breath and shook his head violently, trying to shake the dizziness out of his system.

"I love you, Azula! I do. All you have to do is smile and I'll love you" He said, repeating the words she had said earlier in the conversation.

She looked at him and smiled in a way he hadn't seen her smile in years. It was not a crazy smile, it was not an evil smile, it was as if she had been expecting those words all her life and now she smiled at him expectantly.

"Really?" She asked meekly, and Zuko realized for the first time how much his sister really cared about his approval. How, for all these years, her cruel detachment had been her way of dealing with her feeling that Zuko hated her. That all he had to do, after all these years, to make her change was showing her some affection, a light at the end of the tunnel, just like Iroh had shown him. In the end, what had driven Super-Azula, the one that everybody believed couldn't feel anything but hate, to madness was having the only two people she believed loved her, make her believe that they didn't.

He knew Mai loved Azula, or at least, loved the good days of Azula. Ty Lee, he was almost certain, loved Azula too. Ty Lee, with her bouncy, happy personality was the most affectionate of the trio and was the only person in the world, at least that he knew about, that had willingly hugged Azula.

"I'll find mom, Azula. I promise I'll go to Fa-Ozai again and force him to tell me where she is. I'll bring her here and she'll tell you that she loves you, that you are her little princess, just like she used to. And I'll bring Uncle Iroh and Mai and Ty Lee and they'll tell you that they love you too!"

"They'll say it, yes, because you asked them to or because they fear me, but they won't mean it." She pouted.

Zuko beat himself up for never even trying to have this conversation with his sister. Granted, it had taken five months locked in a mental institution without any other person to talk to besides him and Iroh and a lot of surprisingly good and caring doctors (Zuko had made sure of that) to get her to calm down and finally be able to say the things she had apparently bottled out since she was a little girl.

The first couple of months, she would cry in a constant state of paranoia. The mental institution had devised some special medicine to temporarily bind bending . This made sure that their patients wouldn't hurt themselves or each other, but more than one doctor and nurse had ended up with broken bones thanks to Azula's madness. She had been confined to a jail-like room, where she could see and talk to the people that came to visit her, but she wasn't able to touch them. Eventually the tireless work of the doctors had been fruitful and she started to calm down, to see the people in front of her. They moved her to a normal room, people could come and visit her, touch her, she didn't talk to anyone for a few weeks, but she looked different.

"It's her metamorphosis," Iroh had told Zuko, "Your sister is changing, just like you did in Ba Sing Se and when she is done, she is going to need you more than she ever did. And it is going to be up to you, my dear nephew, to decide what she is going to become."

At first, he didn't know what his uncle meant, but today, he realized that as always, he had been right; that this was probably the most important conversation in Azula's life and maybe in his too.

After weeks, she finally started talking; to the doctors first, Zuko thought now it was because they had been kinder to her and more patient with her than anyone had ever been. One of the doctors, Dr. Koda, specially, seemed to have bonded with Azula in a way Zuko had never thought possible. He was a young doctor; all his credentials portrayed him as a prodigy, just like Azula. He had taken her case because he loved the challenge; he had never had a case he could not "fix" and apparently this was not going to be the one.

Zuko knew that after a little while with Azula, the "challenge" became real affection and that Dr. Koda really cared about Azula. Azula seemed to believe it too and nobody knew what they talked about (Sessions were private and only the doctor and patient will ever know what was discussed in them) but Azula seemed to be confiding in him more and more and be getting better and better with each day that passed.

It had been five months since the comet and since Azula was locked in the hospital. Zuko and Iroh had tried their best to go there every week. Mai and Ty Lee had gone several times, but never dared to talk to her. Zuko believed they felt guilty, or maybe they thought Azula didn't want to see them. He had seen Ty Lee get as close as the door of Azula's room, but it had been a bad day for Azula. She was crying and paranoid, everyone around her was a traitor; just seeing her in that state made Ty Lee run away in tears. Mai followed her friend and comforted her.

After that, Ty Lee couldn't bring herself to come anymore and would cry every time something reminded her of Azula. Mai would come with him or his uncle, but waited outside. She would talk to the doctors, make sure the cook knew what Azula's favorite foods were, make sure she was treated kindly and that she didn't need anything from the outside world. Mai would use her undetached deadpan expression all the time and say that she didn't care. She would say she was doing it because she was Zuko's sister or because Ty Lee had asked her to, but Zuko knew his girlfriend better than that.

Zuko told all that to Azula, how Mai was right outside, how Ty Lee couldn't help crying, how he was going to find their mother and how Iroh still saw the good in her. Azula smiled at him, trying really hard to believe him. He was going to run and get Mai to prove her that he was saying the truth when Doctor Koda came into Azula's room.

"Visiting time is over Zuko," he said as kindly as possible and shared a knowing and affectionate look with Azula.

"But I need Mai to come," Zuko pouted.

"Mai is outside, just like she always is and that knowledge should be sufficient to Azula right now. It has been an intense day for both of you and it is probably better for everybody that we don't keep adding more emotions to the mix," Dr. Koda said.

Zuko knew intuitively that Dr. Koda had expected that conversation to take place that day . He was probably the one that encouraged Azula to talk to Zuko and tell him what she was really feeling and for that, Zuko would be forever indebted to him.

"Mai and Ty Lee can come tomorrow?" Azula said, eagerly and hopefully, almost sounding like the teenager she was. It reminded Zuko of Ty Lee. The doctor nodded, "If they want, of course." She finished her line a lot more sadly and scared that Zuko would have liked to hear at that point.

Zuko kissed Azula's forehead; she seemed surprised but happy.

"See you soon," He said. She just smiled.

Zuko shook the doctor's hand, "I'll never be able to thank you enough," he said and he meant it.

The doctor smiled, Zuko could see the man was as happy as he was and was glad that someone cared about Azula like that.

When Zuko left the room, he could hear the doctor asking, "So, how did it go?"

"It was GREAT," She exclaimed, happily "I never thought he would understand, I never thought he cared, but he does!"

"Of course he cares, Azula! We all care about you!" was the last thing Zuko heard as he left the ward smiling. He never thought she would understand or care either, but she did. He could not wait to tell his uncle and Mai everything that had happened


	2. Chapter 2

**The revised version for the second chapter. Thanks to my amazing and almost psychic reader (Will never know how you get to know what I am trying to say and make it so much better) Jiao-jie, she is really awesome! **

**Chapter II**

Zuko left the ward and ran as fast as he could to find Mai. He was still lightheaded and the pressure in his chest was getting more and more intense. He cursed out of frustration. _One more week,_ he thought to himself, _If it still bothers me in one more week, I'll go have it check out_. He was too happy right now.

He was a little surprised, yet glad, to see how Ty Lee and Mai felt about about the fact that Azula did not hat them; quite in the contrary, she really wanted to see them.

Iroh just smiled beatifically; it was the smile of a man full of wisdom. "I told you. It is her metamorphosis, your sister is changing and she is going to need you more than she ever did. And it is going to be up to you, my dear nephew, to decide what she is going to become."

"You will help me, right?" Zuko said, suddenly burdened with the responsibility.

"I'll always be here for you, whenever you need me, my young FireLord," Iroh smiled.

Zuko was relieved that his uncle had mercy on him and came from hundreds of miles away in the Earth Kingdom; the young FireLord had convinced him that he couldn't have his most trusted advisor living so far away. l. So, Iroh left his teahouse and came to help his nephew run the Nation. Zuko felt selfish knowing that his uncle had sacrificed his dream for him, but he knew he needed his uncle more than any tea-thirsty Earth fellow ever would.

"And for Azula," Iroh finished "She is as much a part of me as you are, my son. If I had known my brother could be so cruel with his own daughter…if I had known". Iroh never said what would had happened if he had known, but the firey anger in his eyes somehow told Zuko that it wouldn't have been pretty.

Zuko involuntarily winced in pain, feeling as if the lighting was still in his body, but it was gone after a few seconds and Zuko paid no attention to it.

Iroh noticed, nonetheless. "Are you ok?" he asked, concerned.

He had noticed some changes in his nephew since the war ended. He seem to avoid training and tired fairly easily, as if any physical activity was strenuous for him and he constantly seemed to bring his hand to his wound as if it still hurt. At first Iroh discarded it, thinking his nephew was just getting over the lighting, but as months passed he tried to convince himself that Zuko didn't have time to train, so he wasn't in such an excellent shape any more and that was the reason for him getting tired so easily. Iroh convinced himself that touching his chest was a tick and that it had always been there. But then, there were moments like this, that lasted for seconds, minutes sometimes, when Zuko was in visible and silent agony and Iroh and Mai would share scared glances, hoping that there would be no trace of fear in the other's eyes. Then, Mai would close her eyes and resume her deadpan expression and Iroh would convince himself that he had never seen any emotion on the girl's face and that everything was ok.

"Hmm?" Zuko asked, confused, "Yes, I was just thinking," he lied, forcing himself to believe his own lie. "I need to find my mother, Uncle! I need to… Azula needs her so she can get better."

_And you need her to be truly happy_, Iroh thought, but didn't say it. He just nodded.

"How do I get my father to tell me?" Zuko said, concerned. Iroh looked at him sadly, Ozai would never tell Zuko. He had tried everything, but Ozai's sole reason for living was making his traitor son miserable and he was extremely good at it. "I need to go see him one more time," Zuko said, standing up. He started gathering some things for the trip; Iroh knew it meant that he was planning to leave "right now," like everything in Zuko's life it couldn't wait one more minute!

Iroh looked concerned. "It is late. Why don't you go rest, you can leave tomorrow morning. It will take you all night to get there, you won't be able to sleep and you want to be as sharp as possible when you meet your father, don't you?"

"It's ok Uncle, I appreciate your concern but I am going to be just fine."

_Where is Mai when one needs her_? Iroh thought to himself, she was usually always there… ALWAYS except when he needed her to help stop Zuko in one of his self-destructive missions. He knew it was late and that Mai had already gone back to her house, not to return until the next day, so Iroh played that card.

"What is Mai going to say if you leave her _again_?" He made sure to stress that word, he was going to play whatever card he had in his sleeve, "Without saying goodbye to her?"

"Don't be overly dramatic, Uncle! I am not leaving her; I'll be back in a couple of days. She is probably going to spend the whole day tomorrow with Azula so she probably won't even realize that I am missing before I can get back."

Iroh sighed, resigned; there was no way to change his nephew's mind. He made sure that he packed some warm healthy food and warm clothing then hugged him goodbye, though not very happily.

"Thank you, Uncle. I don't know what I would do without you," Zuko said absentmindedly.

"You would self-destruct in thirty minutes," he half joked, "Kind of the messages in the stories you used to like when you were a kid."

Zuko laughed, Iroh didn't find it quite so funny.

Zzzzzzzzzzzz

_Somewhere in the Earth Kingdom, earlier that day…_

"Ahh… this is the life! I love being a hero!" said Sokka, laying comfortably in a hammock in front of an automatic moving fan that looked as if it was invented by the mechanicst.

"Hey Hero! Would you like to help us mortals set the table, or would rather not eat?" his sister asked him.

Sokka hopped up and ran to help his sister and Toph set the table.

"Hey! How come Aang's not helping?" Sokka said, offended. "Is he not eating?" heasked, pulling one of those funny faces that were his trademark.

"Aang is helping the Kyoshi warriors get ready for their trip to the Fire Nation," Katara stated

"Yeyyy we're going to see Zuko again!" Sokka said, taking a serving of everything that he could find without waiting for anyone else to be ready to eat.

Half of the Kyoshi warriors, with Ty Lee as their leader, had left for the Fire Nation a while ago. They were actually training a new squad that would protect the newly stated United Four Nations Congress, whose job was to make sure that the four nations handled their problems peacefully and to help maintain peace, security and human rights.

The UFNC was to be headquartered in the Fire Nation for the first ten years, in the Earth Kingdom the next ten, and then the Water Tribe and Air Nomads temples, with offices across the world. It was all Zuko and Iroh's idea, as a way to promote peace and understanding throughout the world. The UFNC was led by Iroh, representative of the Fire Land, Bumi, representative of the Earth Land, Pakku, representative of the Water Land and to represent the Air Land, Aang was supposed to join them with the rest of the Kyoshi warriors, led by Suki. The Kyoshi warriors now had the new mission of protecting the UFNC leaders. It wasn't clear how the 13 year old could serve both as the Avatar and the Air representative, but they were thinking on a way to solve that.

Katara, Toph, Aang, Sokka, Suki and the Kyoshi warriors were enjoying their lunch when a man burst in. He looked old and ragged, as if he had been wearing the same clothes for years. He was visibly tired and thin, his shoes were destroyed, and it looked as if he had been walking for months.

"The Avatar! At last!" He said tiredly, almost collapsing at Aangs feet. Sokka and Katara jumped defensively, ready to attack if the man tried to hurt Aang. Aang thought the man was just too old, weak and tired to represent any threat. "I have been searching for you for months; I walked half the earth to find you!" Suki offered the tired man a glass of water and he drank avidly. "Thank you! That was very refreshing, kind lady"

"Would you like some food?" Aang offered gently, while Sokka's arms greedily tried to cover as much food as possible, his face clearly saying saying: 'No food sharing!'

"After! You need to help me! Only you and your friends can help me rescue her! And I can't walk all the way to the Fire Nation."

"Walk all the way to the Fire Nation?" Katara asked, confused, "Who is 'she?'"

"My lady, my lady Ursa. Now that the war is over, we need to rescue her."

"Lady Ursa?" Toph asked, "As in Zuko's mother?"

The old man nodded. "Lady Ursa of the Fire Nation, mother of Prince Zuko and Princess Azula. Firelord Zuko now, from what I hear."

"Do you know where she is?" Katara asked dubiously; she knew how happy it would make Zuko if they found his mother, but how did they know this was not a trap?

"Yes, I have been taking care of her for all these years," the old man admitted. "I am her most faithful servant," he said proudly.

"Then why didn't she come with you? Where is she? What do we need to rescue her from?" Toph demanded to know.

"You need to understand, Ursa was an unbelievably powerful Firebender, like no other. That is why Ozai had to have her, that is why she had to have his kids, so they would grow up to be the most powerful Firebenders the world have ever seen! But when Ursa killed Azulon to protect Zuko, Ozai realized she represented a threat to him. So he threatened her with the one thing she would do anything for: her children. But Ozai loved Ursa as much as she hated him and he couldn't bring himself to kill her, he needed to be able to see her if he wanted to. She is so beautiful it almost hurts to look at her! But he couldn't banish her either, because there was too much risk that she would come back and take the children or kill Ozai, so he devised a terrible plan.

"Ursa has been kept in suspension, as if time hasn't passed, in a special crystal cage. She is not alive, she is not dead… she is just lingering there, suspended in time. For many years, it was just me taking care of her. The FireLord would come once in a while, just to contemplate her. Eventually I made a home for myself in the remote corner of the South Pole where he sent us. I found a wife, built a family, but I always took care of my Lady Ursa. When I heard the war was over, I knew it was time to set her free. I left my family and headed to the Fire Nation to find the new FireLord and ask him to help me free his mother. I am a poor servant; I walked for miles and miles before realizing I would take me months to get to the Fire Nation, but I would do it if I had to! Luckily, I heard that the Avatar was in the Earth Kingdom with his friends who also know the FireLord, so I thought I could ask you for help to free my lady."

The team was moved.

'We need to go, we need to rescue Zuko's mother," said Aang.

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Zuko left the prison, defeated. Talking to his father was mentally and physically exhausting and never led to anything but pain. Zuko cursed himself for believing that this time was going to be any different. He hadn't gotten anything out of his father. _Unless psychological torture counts as something_. Zuko felt his whole body ache; his chest felt so tight he couldn't breathe, his eyes were fighting to stay open and he was so tired, so very tired. It felt as if Appa had run him over.

He thought of Appa and how the gaang was going to be coming to the Fire Nation soon. He was so excited to see them again; he just wished his chest wouldn't ache so much. _I'll go to a healer as soon as I get back home_ he thought to himself.

He stumbled into the war balloon with the little strength he had left.

"Back home, Sir?" asked a member of the crew.

Zuko nodded and gave one more step. Suddenly the earth loomed closer yet farther at the same time. He heard some asking him if he was ok, but the voice seemed so distant. It was getting dark, so dark.

"FireLord Zuko," was the last thing he heard before totally losing consciousness.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter III

Zuko was twisting and turning with nightmares. His face was drenched in sweat and he was wheezing.

"No. I won't fight you. No, dad please! I am your most loyal son!" Zuko murmured in his nightmares. Mai gave a quiet and hidden sob and Iroh looked at her confused, he never though he would see the impassive girl cry, he didn't think that was even possible. "Mom... don't leave me, please come back!" He kept on pleading from his feverish bed.

"Calm down, nephew." Iroh said softly caressing his arm "They are just nightmares, we are here with you. For you."

Zuko seemed to calm down for a second, minimally moving his body towards his uncle. Mai stood right beside the bed, leaning to gently peck Zuko's lips, while caressing his hair.

Iroh knew she had a thousand things she wanted to say, all those feelings fighting to come out; but when she spoke, all it came out was a meek.

"Please."

Iroh wondered what she was begging for, but didn't ask.

It took almost 2 days none-stop for the A-team, Aang, Katara, Toph, Sokka and Suki with Ursa's keeper, Tse, to reach Ursa's south pole prison.

They noticed that Tse was a quiet being, extremely goal oriented. They had no time to breath after landing, he was running pointing to a cave in the glaciers, signaling them to follow.

Katara and Toph, a little more cautious and distrustful than the rest, made sure that everybody was ready for a fight. Tse didn't seem to mind their distrust and was very concern with leading them to the cage.

Still, when they entered, the realized they had nothing to fear. The cave was empty and shallow; you could see all the walls and there was nowhere for any enemy to hide. In the back of the cave, like engraved in the ice, was Ursa. Illuminated by a million beams of colorful lights produced by the sun hitting the ice and the crystal that she was in, she looked like forever stopped in time, floating and ethereal, trapped in her transparent cage. It looked almost surreal, like a painting in the wall. Her eyes were closed and the whole setting was an impressive, beautiful, yet sad spectacle for the eyes.

Katara gasped in astonishment while Sokka walked to the wall and touched it, like outlining Ursa's figure with his finger, trying hard to believe that the figure inside the ice was once a real human being.

"What? I can't see anything in this ice!" Toph said, somehow upset. "What is going on? Is she there? Does she look like Zuko?"

"There is a woman, a beautiful woman, dressed as Firenation royalty embedded in the wall" Suki explained calmly.

"This is my lady Ursa" Said Tse, pointing at the floating woman with his two hands.

"Ok, lets get her OUT then" Toph said firmly. She could not see the strange vision of the floating woman hit by sun beams, so she wasn't in the same speechless amazement as the rest of the crew. She moved, looking as if she was about to break something.

"Toph, wait" Aang finally said something "We don't know how to get her out of there." He looked at Tse.

The servant shrugged. "I don't know, if I knew, I would have gotten her out of here already!"

"Is she embedded in the ice? Then just melt the ice Katara!" Said Toph in a very earth like way. An obstacle is in front of you, you stand there and face it, usually just break it.

"Hold!" Aang said one more time. "What if by melting the ice around her, we cause more harm than good?"

"She is not trapped in ice." Tse said, "she is surrounded by ice, the ice eventually covered her transparent tomb, by she is not in ice. You can remove the ice and she will still be there, trapped in the crystal, like she has been for 9 years."

"So how do we get her out of the crystal?" Sokka said outloud, more thinking about a solution more than really expecting someone to know for him. "Maybe we can just break the Crystal?"

"No!" Tse yelled "Firelord Ozai was very clear, if I attempt to brake the crystal, she'll die."

" And you actually believed the sick in the head firelord?" Toph said indignant " I vote for breaking it!"

"But what if she dies?" Katara said " We can't tell Zuko that we found his mother and then killed her?"

"What do you want to do sweetness?" Toph replied, angrily " You want to take the whole Crystal to Zuko, so he can go insane trying to see how to rescue her?"

"That is not such a bad idea. We can take the whole crystal to Zuko, I am sure he will find a way to rescue her." Sokka said.

"Appa can't carry the whole cave in his back, besides, we dont know what would happen if we move her." Aang thought out-loud.

"Well, we can just go get Zuko and bring him here." It was Katara's turn.

"Pff.. that is such a good idea, bring the new and obsessive Firelord to the south pole, where he will spend the rest of his life and all his resources trying to save his mother. I see no coup d'état in the firenation future at all. Say sayonara to our newly found peace!"

Katara pierced her with her glare, mentally throwing knifes at the earthbender with her eyes. But Toph was blind, and piercing glares do not really pierce if you can't see them.

"Ok, so what is _YOUR_ great idea? All you are doing is just making fun of everybody and shoot down ideas, but you haven't though of anything helpful so far either." Katara said angrily.

"Calm down!" said Aang "No need to fight! We have been here for only a few minutes, we need some more time to come up with a solution."

"Yes!" Said Sokka happily "Lets eat! We will all think better with food in our stomach!"

" Sokka, all you can do is think about food?" His sister scolded him.

"Who is the one shooting down ideas now, sweetness?" Toph smirked at her.

$$$$$$

Zuko woke up absolutely disoriented. Breathing was hard and painful and he felt as If someone was squeezing his internal organs with brute force. He tried to open his eyes, but it was as if someone was pushing his eyelids down, making them impossibly heavy to lift. He was hot and cold and it felt as if the room was spinning making him dizzy and nauseous. Instinctively, he produced fire from his hands as he forced himself to use all the strength he had to free his eyes.

"Calm down, Zuko. Everything is ok, relax." Mai said gently touching her boyfriend's arm with one hand and caressing his face with the other, while carefully avoiding getting burn. The flame that he was producing was minimal, due to his state, but it could still burn. "Shh… is ok." She whispered lovingly when she saw the panicked and confused expression in his eyes "Everything is fine, relax, my dear" She gently kissed his burning forehead. "It is just Iroh and me."

Zuko was finally lucid enough to look around him and sighed in relief and exhaustion. He was in his room, in the palace. Mai to his left and Iroh to his right, they both were smiling at him lovingly and oh-ever-so-sadly.

"How are you feeling, nephew?"

"Wha—t-ha—ppe-ned?" It felt like it took him a decade to manage to say that simple line.

Mai and Iroh look at each other and then at Zuko and again at each other, as if none of them wanted to speak.

"You collapsed in the war balloon after seeing your father. The crew rushed you here. You were barely alive by the time you got to the palace." Iroh said as tears threatened to come out of his eyes. "It looks as if the lighting has damaged your internal organs. Mostly your heart and lungs, if they would have seen it sooner…" Iroh swallowed loudly "They are doing all they can. Everything is going to be fine, my nephew. Just rest, ok.?"

Zuko thought to himself that those were the least reassuring words he had ever heard from his uncle, but he was so tired, the thought of speaking made him sweat. And seeing the devastated faces around him, he couldn't bring himself to ask any more questions or make them feel any more pain. He smiled kindly and lovingly at his uncle. Then turned to Mai, who did the lamest attempt of a reassuring smile, he grabbed her hand, still resting on his cheek, dragged to his lips and gently kissed it. Mai hold back a sob.

He tried to tell them that he was ok, that they shouldn't worry. He opened his mouth and tried, but he couldn't mutter the strength to do so. Iroh realized how much the was trying.

"Here, drink this tonic. It will help you get better." He said grabbing a glass from the night table behind him.

Zuko eyed the tonic suspiciously; it's brown-purple color and thick consistency made it look anything but appetizing. It looked as if someone had blended sea prunes and mud from a swamp. Zuko took the eyes from the tonic and looked at his uncle as if saying "You are kidding me, right?"

"Zuko!" The old general said firmly "You don't have even enough strength to talk, this will help you regain some strength" and with that he put the glass right under Zuko's nose.

The smell of the tonic was even worst than the looks of it and Zuko instinctively use the little strength he had to move as far as he could from the glass in front of him. Though considering how little strength he had at that point, that was not more than a couple of inches.

Iroh moved the glass close to his mouth one more time and commanded, "Drink!"

Zuko turned his head to the side, trying to avoid the glass.

"No" He managed to say " 'mfine" he mumbled something that he wanted to sound like "I am fine"

"Come on nephew, be a good boy." Iroh pleaded.

Zuko shook his head vigorously but then he realized that was a terrible idea, he closed his eyes trying to stop the world from spinning, taking short breath with his moth open.

Mai took the glass from Iroh's hand, press it against Zuko's mouth before he even opened his eyes again and started damping the content. Zuko chocked for a second before realizing what was happening.

Mai sighed, trying to appear bored "Quit being such a whining baby and drink!" Mai said in her soft voice, trying to not let her feelings show.

Zuko was left with the choice of choking or swallowing, reluctantly, he choose the second one and discovered that the tonic tasted exactly as bad as it smelled, if not even worst.

Finally Mai removed the glass and Zuko looked at her, the taste, still fresh in his mouth, contorting his face into a disgusted grimace.

"Eww, ugh, yuck!"

Mai sighed again "Stop whining" she acted bored.

Zuko looked at her surprised, true, that is how Mai interacted with most people; but since that time at Ember Island, and after several conversations where he convinced her that not only he wasn't going to stop loving her if she showed feelings, even if those feelings weren't the nicest ones; but that he actually wanted to know what she felt, Mai had open up and showed her feelings to him. True, she wasn't a fountain of expressions, but he would have expected her to feel _something _seeing him there, lying terribly ill.

But then it came... under her breath and barely audible, but he could see the flame in her eyes and the tension in her face as she mumbled.

"After all you put us through, you have no right to complain. How could you not tell us that there was something wrong, how could you do this to us?"

Mai had turned her head away from him, so he could only see her profile, but had become an expert at reading the tiny tweaks in her face that would denote was she was really feeling. He could see the fear she was trying to hide. He summoned strength from the love he felt for her and stretched enough to hold her hand.

"I am sorry, Mai." He whispered weakly and finally she looked at him, he saw her eyes were glassy, but she wasn't going to let herself cry, he knew her that much. "I am going to be ok."

"You better be!" She threaten him.

She looked at him, he looked so tired, so sick, so weak, so frail a part of her just wanted to scream. She was so torn, so angry, so scared, so many things... She didn't like strong feelings and hated to be in this situation.

She saw him looking at her pleading, he was so weak, his eyes were fighting to close again and she knew he needed to sleep; yet he fought it, he needed to make sure that she was o.k, that they were o.k, he just needed a kind word from her.

"Go to sleep, sweetheart." She said kissing his burning forehead, her voice not as tender as Zuko would have liked, but he was going to take whatever he could get.

"Sorry." He mumbled with his eyes closed "Love- you- didn't - mean- worry- you."

She pecked his lips now and caressed his cheek "I love you too, Zuko. Just rest." She said a lot more tenderly.

Zuko fell asleep as soon as he heard his girlfriend say I love you.


End file.
